This week James, a captain based at Heathrow shares his career journey from training in the RAF to becoming a certified trainer. He talks about the importance of both technical and soft skills, how you can practise flying a plane at home, and what qualifications you'll need to become a pilot
Participants
- Emily Slade - podcast producer and host, Prospects
- James Gosling - pilot
Transcript
Emily Slade: Hello and welcome back to Future You, the podcast brought to you by graduate careers experts, prospects. I'm Emily Slade and in this episode I speak to James, who works as a pilot.
James Gosling: So I'm James Gosling and I fly the Airbus 320 Neo aircraft for SAS, the Scandinavian Airlines, and I'm a captain there.
Emily Slade: Perfect. And did you always want to be a pilot?
James Gosling: Pretty much since I was seven years old when I got taken up in a little aeroplane. And I was just completely fascinated by it from then on.
Emily Slade: That's amazing. So you fully realise this dream. So how did that happen? At what age can you start becoming a pilot? When did it begin?
James Gosling: So you can start flying training, you know, when you're And you're almost big enough to touch the controls, but from 16, I believe you can actually go solo. A friend at school had gone solo in a small aircraft before he passed his driving test. Wow. Yeah. So it is possible to do it that young. There are various organisations like the Air Cadets that will help you do that, maybe flying gliders first before power flight. But yeah, you can start it pretty young. I did a little bit of that. And then I joined the Air Force when I was 18. I was having done A-levels. I was actually going to universities, doing interviews, etc. But I really wanted to be a fast jet pilot in the RAF. So I applied there. I thought they might tell me to come back after university or no thanks. But they said, yeah, we'll take you. And I was 18. So Most of my flying training was with the Air Force.
Emily Slade: Yeah, oh, incredible. So what did that look like? What did your training journey look like within the Air Force?
James Gosling: So the first thing in military training is to do basic military training. It's probably the same in all three services. You learn a lot about how to look after yourself, a lot of core skills like survival skills, living off the land, leadership, teamwork, You get very, very fit, some marching around. And then you do some academic studies to do with the military, improve your writing and communication skills, that sort of thing. And then you pass out after about 18 weeks. And then after that, you begin your flying training. So flying training, where the civilian or military always starts with a lot of classroom work and a lot of exams that have to be passed so that you've got a good grounding in all the theoretical subjects before you start flying training itself. And the military train in a similar way to civilian training. You'll get very, very good flying instruction. And usually after about 9 or 10 hours in the air, you get to your first solo, which is your first big milestone. In the military, you can progress on to flying helicopters or transport aircraft, or in my case, onto the fast jets. And that's probably where the first divergence or difference between the military training and civilian training occurs because You're flying faster aircraft and you'll do formation, which is where you fly with other aircraft. You'll learn that. You'll learn all weathers, day and night. And then in the military, you'll be introduced to all the weapon systems and how all that works. And then you'll progress onto what we call a frontline aircraft, onto a frontline squadron, which is where you start doing the job that the taxpayer is paying you to do. But the training never stops. You arrive on your first squadron and then it's some time before you're actually what they call ready for combat. And it's actually called combat ready.
Emily Slade: So is it luck that you were able to do this in the sense that I think my dad wanted to be a pilot, but he wears glasses, so he wasn't allowed to train as one. Do you have to hit certain almost health checks and eyesight checks in before you can begin this training, before they let you do it.
James Gosling: Yeah, and that's a really important point actually. If you join the military, they will give you right at the beginning of the assessment before you've made any commitment or if they've made you an offer, you'll do a full medical and it will check out all of those aspects. And certainly for the military, your eyesight really needs to be pretty good. and you need not to have had any asthma or hay fever, that sort of thing, I think, definitely asthma. In the civilian world, if you're thinking about being a pilot, before you commit to spending any money, you need to go and get yourself what's called a class one aviation medical checkup, because that will highlight if there are any unfortunate conditions that you didn't know about that would prevent you becoming a professional pilot. So that's a really important one. The eyesight restrictions are less stringent for the civilian pilot than they are for the military pilot.
Emily Slade: That's good to know. And your officer training and your pilot training, do any of those things equate to a sort of qualification like a university degree? Is this transferable skills and a certification that you can take away with you once you leave the army or is it very much army specific?
James Gosling: Yeah, so in my case, RAF or Royal Air Force, it's a really good question because it should be because you do so much training at that early stage and also throughout your career, you go on courses as you develop and you develop management skills. But Really, it takes a civilian employer to have an understanding about what you do in the military and what it means for them to realise what skills you might have to offer. And some employers are more aware than others. In other aspects, you might have to, in an interview, sell yourself a little bit better. But when you leave the military, you go on a transition course where certainly you'll get a lot of help in how to do interviews and how to write CVs and so on. For me, when I left the military, I knew I wanted to go into civilian aviation. So that was a little bit more type specific. But there are certain employers out there that are very good at knowing what they're getting with a military trained person who's achieved sort of management or senior management level. One that comes to mind is John Lewis, for instance.
Emily Slade: That's fantastic. So in terms of leaving the RAF, going into a civilian, I was going to call it pilotry, aviation, what opportunities are out there? Do you just have to go to an airport and pick a, you know, EasyJet, Ryanair, and then start flying there? Like what's out there for pilots in the civilian world?
James Gosling: Okay, so whether you've been in the military or whether you're starting, you're in the same pool of people looking for a job. Now, occasionally, certain airlines might know that they want certain qualities that, for instance, a military pilot who's flown military transport aircraft, might have. So they might go along to get in touch with people at RAF Bryce Norton, for instance, which is our main transport hub in the military. And, you know, they might just say, if anyone's leaving, you know, we're looking to recruit and they might have a sort of fast track scheme there. But for me, there was nothing like that at the time. But the first thing I had to do was get qualified. So the civilian licensing system is completely different. And so I had to take all of the exams again of all the academic subjects. And I had to prove that I could fly an aeroplane with two engines in the clouds, if you like, using nothing but the instruments. This is called the instrument rating test, which is one of the big hurdles that all civilian pilots will need to do. They want to be commercial pilots. And so you have to get all of those licenses before you can actually apply to an airline. And then really what you need to do is lots of research to find out what the different companies are like. You might decide that EasyJet's for you, or you want British Airways, and so on. But a lot will depend upon who's recruiting at the time. And the reality of it is, particularly if you've started from scratch, you're going to have a loan to pay back and could be as much as 110,000 pounds. Yeah. And so you might be motivated to get the first job that's available and you'll find out who's recruiting. So you'll get pretty savvy on various websites about job availability and who is recruiting. Now, one thing I can recommend, because I've been speaking to some of my first officer colleagues when I've been at work, who've been through the system and they've I've been with my company for the last year and they said the first step is to attend a Pilot Careers Live Expo and there's a website pilotcareernews.com live and have a look there and you'll find out when there's going to be an expo anywhere near you. And you can go there and you'll see representatives of all the big training schools, the smaller training schools, the airlines, and so on. And you'll better get a flavour then of which company you might want to work for, which lifestyle you might like, or whatever, you know, because there are options other than airlines, maybe some government organisations who fly smaller airplanes to do certain specialist roles. There's air ambulance work, business, aviation, that sort of thing. The biggest employer, of course, is passenger fly. And so if you go to a pilot career live expo, you'll certainly get representatives there from all the larger airlines. And then you'll be able to see your way and which choice you might want to make.
Emily Slade: Yeah, fantastic. So you mentioned briefly the cost there. That was going to be my next question. This is if you get your A-levels, you leave university, you want to be a pilot, this is all things you have to fund off your own back, I assume, these licenses you have to acquire, no one's going to sponsor you. to get these licenses. And unlike a car or even maybe a boat, you can't really practice on a plane as easily as you could, like a horse, for example. So how do you sort of navigate that? Like what advice do you have?
James Gosling: Okay, so the first thing is that there are a very, very small number of totally sponsored cadet ships. Maybe the larger legacy carriers like British Airways would offer this, but very, very few and far between. But the 110,000 pounds, that's the worst case. If an airline like EasyJet, for instance, was to be in a recruiting mode, they might say to you, well, look, come and do our assessment. And if you pass our assessment, we might decide that we're going to sponsor you. It doesn't mean that they're going to pay for your training, but they might support your loan and they would be more likely to give you a job at the end of your training should you be successful. Other airlines will do that as well. So all other airlines are also available. It depends who's doing what at the time. The big number there, 110,000 pounds, that would be to do what we call totally integrated training. That's you go to a big training organisation and they literally look after you from the beginning right up until this is how you write your CV, this is how you conduct yourself in airline interviews, these are the contacts we've got in the airlines and probably the maybe top 20% of the candidates in the results at the end of that training will probably more likely get a job with one of the airlines that can then pick the top 20. The other way of doing it is what's called modular. And this would be for somebody either who just can't get a loan for that amount of money, or they don't want to, or they've got a career or a job already. And so they can carry on with their current job and then do various modules of the training and gradually work their way until they've finished the training. That's called modular training. And many of the larger flying training organisations offer that as well. Or you can pick and choose yourself. Maybe the advantage of that one is that you've got a bit more life experience by the time you come to an airline. You've you've had a few knocks on the way and you've had another career, so that can be an advantage. But obviously the integrated one, it's kind of easier, you don't have to think about it so much because, there's a pathway within the organisation and lots of support for you. that sort of thing. And the modular scheme would be a lot less expensive than the fully integrated one.
Emily Slade: Yeah, absolutely. Fantastic. Thank you. So in terms of skill sets that a person would need to enter into this industry, and not just technical, but soft skills as well, what are we looking for?
James Gosling: Okay, that's a really good question, because not only what you're looking for, but what you need to develop and demonstrate all the time as a pilot in your job. And those skills are assessed every time you go to the simulator, which is generally about six months, every six months for two days, you go to the simulator. And obviously they're going to assess your technical skills, but they're also, and as importantly, looking at your soft, your non-technical skills. And so those are things like, communication, how you communicate, situational awareness, your problem solving and decision making. Really important one is workload management, leadership and teamwork. And another one which I always think is very useful for all parts of your life is stress management and sleep and fatigue, which Sleep fatigue is not assessed, but it certainly talked a lot about, I was a human factors training trainer in a previous company and taught this subject for, I think, about 10 years in addition to my flying role. And when, as you know, when you teach something, you learn a lot about it yourself. And I certainly learned a lot about, you know, stress management and only stressing about the things you can't or you can influence and not those that you can't, for instance, and how to mitigate against that. It's been really, really useful for my own sort of well-being. So you don't have to be a rocket scientist, far from it. You need to be able to get on with people. I think that's really important. You need some certain motor skills, good situational awareness. And although you mentioned that You mentioned about the horse riding in preparation for something. There are very good flight simulators that you can use on your own home computer. And I don't do it myself, but some of my colleagues do when they're preparing for the simulator, they might try and run some of the profiles just to remind themselves of some of the procedures. So Microsoft Simulator, I think it's called, they do some very good simulations so that you can get a little bit ahead when you're at home.
Emily Slade: Yeah, brilliant. That's fantastic. You mentioned the human factors training. Can you tell us what that is? And did you have to train again in order to deliver that? Or was that something you were able to move into because of your previous qualifications and experience?
James Gosling: So no, I had to be trained certainly in how to deliver it. So there was a lot of train the trainer and we used to write our own courses as well. So I got a little bit involved in that. It was an ideal fit for me because I was hugely aware that, the most important thing that we do in aviation is keep it safe. And in the military, there were times when operationally, Sometimes the safety wasn't, you just couldn't keep it as safe as you'd like to, although you try to. And so I was very aware that things can go wrong, having lost some friends in the military. So I was really keen to be involved in anything that makes aviation safer. And human factors has grown and developed and become more and more important really since the 70s when they started looking at why certain accidents were happening. And they realised that having analysed a number of awful airline accidents that had happened over decades, that in 70% of them, human factors were involved as a major contributor to what went wrong. So I was really motivated to get into it. Plus, I find people very interesting and it deals with people and behaviours.
Emily Slade: Yeah, brilliant. What myths can you debunk about being a pilot?
James Gosling: Okay, so we don't sit in the seat, press a few buttons, and then just sit back and read the paper. That's That's for sure. And it is true that some of these aircraft have automatic landing systems. I used one last week in Malmo when it was low visibility, so fog and very low cloud. And I needed to let the automatic landing system work. But I do that probably three or four times in a year. And most of the time, we need to land the aircraft ourselves for two reasons. One is that we need to keep our skills up. Another is that if we're using the automatic landing system, the airport has to reduce the number of air movements. This is why you get delays and cancellations at the busier airports, you know, when it's foggy. They have to increase the safety margins when people can't see where they're going. And we're talking about for instance, landing an aircraft at approaching 150 miles an hour when there's only 75 metres visibility. So it's quite an amazing system. So, but there is a myth that, you know, the airplane just lands itself. It can do, but very rarely do we use that option. But it's very, very nice to have when you do need it.
Emily Slade: Definitely. And can. Can people come into the cockpit when you're flying to watch? Or is that just in the movies?
James Gosling: Very good question. Yeah, mostly probably in the movies, definitely not in the UK. And other countries may have less stringent security than we do in the UK, but it's really strict. UK and USA, very, very strict rules about that. However, we do welcome people when on the ground, when the engines aren't running. That's perfectly all right. And just the other evening, I was going to fly from Stockholm to Heathrow and my cabin senior, that's what we call the senior cabin crew in my airline. She said, I've got a really, really nervous passenger. And she said, the last time I had a really, really nervous passenger, we actually had to go back to the stand and offload. So she said, is there any chance that you could have a word? And so I said, yeah, of course. And so I could see this poor chat was, you know, visibly quite scared. And so I spent quite a while talking about all the redundant systems we have and all the safety, et cetera. And then I found out he'd never flown before. And he said, what about turbulence? Are we going to have any? And I said, look, we are going to have a little bit of turbulence. It shouldn't be too much. And he said, what's it like? And I said, imagine you're driving in a car or on a bus or in a taxi and it hits some bumps. That's what it's like. And he stayed with us. And I was really pleased when all the customers were getting off. He was in front talking to the senior. He had a big smile on his face because he was going to go and see his girlfriend. He hadn't seen her for a long time.
Emily Slade: Oh, that's really wonderful. That's really good that you took the time to do that and that it worked out so well. That's really lovely. So that was a lovely story. What has been your proudest moment as a pilot?
James Gosling: Okay, so I think in the military, it would have been when I'd been asked to plan and lead a 45 aircraft multinational mission. I had to organise the whole thing, brief it, plan it, fly it. And I think my proudest moment of that was that everybody got home safely. And I was kind of proud as well because, we were very much in the Royal Air Force. We kind of fight a little bit above our weight sometimes. And we were working with some coalition air forces a lot larger than ours. I'm sure you can guess who that was. And kind of nice when, one of them says, you did a good job for us today. And another one, I suppose, was in the civilian world, getting my commands, getting to be a captain. That's quite a big one, really.
Emily Slade: Yeah, that's cool. Does that come with its own special badge or hat or something to signify?
James Gosling: Yeah, in our case, you get a little bit more braid on the on the peak of your cap.
Emily Slade: Nice.
James Gosling: But in all companies, you get an extra stripe. So you get 4 stripes. And that's really so that any crew, passengers or emergency services, people like that, they can see that immediately and know, you know, who's the decision maker and who they need to talk to.
Emily Slade: Off the back of that, Do you, are you, I assume you're completely trained in terms of first aid. Is it your responsibility to be able to cope in terms of dangerous situations when you think about a plane, if it has to land, do an emergency landing, the cabin crew tend to be the ones giving the sort of advice and the help and that sort of thing. But would you be expected to join in on that and take a lead there?
James Gosling: Yeah, really excellent question. So in SAS, I received the first aid training, the same as the cabin crew, which was great because a lot of airlines stopped training the flight crew, the pilots in first aid training. It used to be mandatory. And their reasoning was that for most of the time, for security reasons, the cockpit door is locked. But of course, As you've just indicated, you might land somewhere and before any emergency services might get to you or that you may be somewhere remote, having that first aid training is really useful. The cabin crew are the first responders, if you like, and whilst we're in flight, that's a really, really important role that they have to be really competent at. And my role is in flying the aircraft is in communicating with them to decide whether we've got to the point that we need to actually stop going to our destination and decide that we're going to divert the aircraft if it's what we call a medical emergency. Sometimes you do and sometimes you don't. And so it's really important that we're communicating with the cabin crew on that. There are resources out there as well that can help you with that decision and some airlines are signed up to where there are 24 hour medics on call and you can dial them up and tell them what the symptoms are and they'll even know when you tell them where you are, they'll even know where the nearest specialist hospital is, at which airport, et cetera, for that condition, then you as the pilot have to say, well, unfortunately, that airport's not available. You know, it's got snow all over it or something. But it's a really good question because I was really pleased when I joined SAS to be getting first aid training again, because I just think it's an important life skill because you might be at a bus stop and somebody has a heart attack and, you know, I know hopefully a little bit about how to use a defibrillator and, the first things to do if you find somebody who needs your help like that. But it's the cabin crew, it's their main, that's their main priority.
Emily Slade: Yeah, absolutely. Brilliant. What advice would you give to aspiring pilots?
James Gosling: So really, just don't give up. And, you know, if you don't, if your first option doesn't work, try the next one and just keep at it. If you really want to do it, keep doing it. I know pilots who haven't even started until they're in their 40s and they still manage to get the job that they've always dreamed of. So yeah, don't give up. There's a lot of different ways of going about it. does sound like an enormous amount of money that you have to get as a loan or whatever, but there are other ways of doing it. Like I mentioned, the modular routes. Or you could be a flying instructor for many years and do it that way and build up your experience as a flying instructor, which is a really, really worthwhile role as well.
Emily Slade: Yeah, definitely. That's great to hear that it can still be a career change option, but it's not something you have to tick off at the age of 18. Like being a professional footballer, you can just come in at any time. That's great. So on that, how do you strike a healthy work-life balance? I imagine if you're, you've mentioned just in this call that you've been in like 4 different countries in the past week. So how does that work?
James Gosling: Yeah, fantastic question. And there will be times in a pilot's career where you have to say to family and friends, look, I'm really not going to be around for a few weeks or maybe even a month. Perhaps when you're doing what's called a type rating, which is a very intense course with a lot of simulators. And simulators are never going to be near your home. And, you know, when you get your command upgrade, that sort of thing. And really, it's about compromise and communication. And, you know, if you explain to people why you're doing something, they generally will understand it. But also in the sort of lifestyle balance, or if you like, the priorities of people with families, certain aviation jobs are better for that than others. So the regional airlines, which in our case would just fly within the UK, generally pretty sociable hours and you'll be home at night. Certain other carriers, you know, like maybe it's a big holiday carrier companies, you'll normally be at home at night. In my job, I'm away quite a lot, but I have more days off than Most people do. At the other end of the scale, there's long haul. I've done long haul. I'm glad I've done it. I don't wish to do it anymore. And for a lot of people, it's a good thing to do, you know, maybe as soon as you can before you settle down and start having children. But, you know, people can have happy family lives and be a long haul pilot. You just need to have an understanding family, I guess. And the other thing about the work lifestyle balance is I think it's really important to stay fit and healthy. We have to pass a medical every, at least every year when you're older, every six months. And to do that, it helps if you look after yourself, you know, good diet, take any opportunity you can to exercise. And I do that. So I spend a lot of time in Scandinavia in various hotels. And I always try and go to the gym. And that helps your musculoskeletal issues because you're sitting in one position for quite a lot of the time. And I try and do cardio. And when I'm at home, I've got a Border Collie that needs a lot of exercise. So that keeps me fit.
Emily Slade: Oh, yay. Yeah. Do you, when you're on long haul or even regional flights and you're staying over in that country, do you get time and opportunities to like chill out and be a tourist? Or do you, after the 47th time this month that you've gone to, I don't know, Finland, you're sort of happy with your premier in?
James Gosling: So definitely with long haul, that's an advantage. And when I used to do long haul, I was able to go around. I went on a road trip once starting off in Montreal, did Niagara Falls, went up the East Coast. Those opportunities aren't there quite as much as they used to be, but they still are there with long haul. With what I do, Occasionally, I've got the opportunity to, maybe if I've been on standby and I'm away from home and I didn't get called out, then quite often you've got some time there. I remember having a really pleasant afternoon in Gothenburg in the summer. And recently, I did have the opportunity of going to the centre of Stockholm. But My colleague that I was going to go with, he was really tired, so we didn't go in the end. I mean, it is quite tiring what we do, but yeah, there is the opportunity a little bit, but it does alter, it depends where you're working and who you're working for. But yeah, certainly you can make the effort to do that, but mostly it's long haul, certainly where you'll get the opportunity to do that more.
Emily Slade: Yeah, definitely. What are some of the biggest challenges that you face?
James Gosling: Okay, well, I think if you look at the whole career, I didn't think it would ever happen to me, which is when you lose your job. I thought Thomas Cook would have been there forever. But suddenly you find yourself without a job. And the only, well, the main problem when a company goes down is there are 500 other people looking for exactly the same jobs that you're looking for. And that's quite challenging. And, it does happen. And in my case, there was a kind of double whammy because I went through the process of making myself the best that I could present. You know, there are courses that you can go on about interview techniques, and how to do group exercises, all of those things which are really important and very important at the time. And then I secured my next dream job. And then I was just about to start it when COVID came along. So COVID came along and even though I'd signed a contract, you know, who knew about COVID and what was going to happen. And so I was told there'd be a delay and then actually nothing happened. And you sort of feel a bit cast off and that's all quite challenging. But that's where, and I'd say this to anybody who's trying to get their first job, this is where resilience is really important because you've just got to keep at it. You've got to keep your skills up, your knowledge up. It's harder to keep your knowledge up when you're not actually flying because you're not using that knowledge all the time. So you really have to discipline yourself. There are a lot of resources out there many of which are free, where you can keep the knowledge up. There's one which I think is excellent called the A320 podcast. And I used that a lot when I didn't have an airline job. So that if I went for an interview or a simulator assessment and they gave me a failure of a hydraulic system, you know, I'd been listening to that while I was walking the dog, that sort of thing. The resilience is is really helpful for that. So anyone looking for their first job, just keep in mind you might not get your first assessment, you might not be offered a job, just keep at it. But it is challenging sometimes, but if you keep at it, you'll get there in the end.
Emily Slade: Yeah, fantastic. What does a typical day flying an aeroplane look like and feel like?
James Gosling: Yeah, so Generally, the first thing you're interested in is the weather. If the weather's good at your departure airfield or airport and at the destination, that takes a whole lot of workload off you. As soon as the weather's bad, you've got an awful lot more to think about. And so you'll generally know even the day before, say maybe even the night before, you're going to start looking at it and you're going to start mentally preparing yourself so that things don't come as a big surprise and you're having to do a lot of work, make a lot of decisions, you're already half prepared. And that could be the wind, very strong winds like we've had recently. It could be fog and low cloud, that's really going to affect things. And certainly where I fly a lot this time of the year, we're talking about snow and ice. Snow and ice, that's certainly going to affect your day. It can be on the runway, it can be on the aircraft, you've got to make sure that it's not on the aircraft when you take off. So there's a lot of work to do with that. So yeah, you consider the weather and you need to be thinking about how much fuel you want loaded onto the aircraft. And then generally you'll go and meet your first officer, your other pilot, and you'll come to a joint decision about who, for instance, is going to do the flying, because the captain doesn't always do the flying. We share that. So if you're flying two or three times in a day, one of you might fly twice, one of you might fly once, or you completely share it. And we'll decide that generally at the beginning of the day. You might have a less experienced pilot, and if the weather's a little bit more challenging than there are various rules about whether they can do the landing and that sort of thing. So you make those sort of decisions then. Decide on how much fuel you think you want to have put on board and then meet the crew. And there's always a senior caring crew. You might have met the crew before, you might know some of them, none of them, and you need to build up a good relationship, you know, as soon as possible. Basically, you want to feel them to feel that they can approach you because, they might have some important information about noises that they think are unusual or they notice sighs on the wing, on the ground, something like that. And you really want them to feel that they can come and talk to you about it. So you try and build up a relationship with them really quickly. And then you get down to the aircraft. And there's a lot to do to prepare the aircraft, but we have various procedures. Normally we split the roles between the two pilots, the cabin crew doing their duties, and then there'll be the time when the passengers come on board. And that's normally when the two pilots then come together and we start our briefing and we're going to brief what we're going to do. This is generally just the takeoff and the departure. And what we're going to do if things don't go to plan or we have some failures so there's not a big shock. If it happens, it's all about safety really and what we call threat and error management. After that, we find out all the passengers got on board and that's when the captain will do a PA to the passengers. We want them to feel that they're in safe hands, but we're going to take good care of them. some idea about the time they want to be punctual. Many of them have got business meetings to go to or they've got connecting flights perhaps. So, you know, they're interested in how the time is going. And then, you know, I'll just ask them to follow any instructions and guidance from the cabin crew because the number one priority is their safety. And then we'll get going. Flying out of somewhere like Heathrow is amazing because it's incredibly busy there, but they have some of the best people, I think, in air traffic control who manage to get you away on time when, there's a huge amount of traffic coming in and out of there. And you're on your way flying through some of the busiest airspace in the world, which is quite fascinating. And then after about 10 minutes, If there's been cloud and it was dark and foggy, you might suddenly emerge above the cloud. And the other day I had on my left hand side, I could see the moon still just above the horizon as the sun, you know, was coming up on the other side. It's, you know, some amazing views that we get, which is one of the great advantages of the job. And kind of preparing for the approach. is another sort of, that's where the workload comes up a little bit more and of course the approach and the landing itself. And you can repeat that two or three times in a day. Sometimes some of your crew will change or your colleague will change or you get off and go to another airplane. If you're doing long haul, obviously you stay with the same crew and you just do that one flight and maybe go through lots of different time zones and arrive somewhere with completely different weather than the weather you left. But yeah, it's a fantastic job, really. And no two days are the same.
Emily Slade: Yeah, I can imagine. Yeah, it sounds wonderful. That's brilliant. Thank you. Amazing. That's lovely. Do you always tell the, like, plane, like, everyone look, it's the moon or everyone look, it's the Northern Lights. Do you like give them a heads up?
James Gosling: If it's something a little bit spectacular, but not if it's really late at night, and I think people might be asleep, and not really early in the morning, but at other times. And if I know that a flight in the summer, for instance, is for people going to a holiday destination, then I kind of, I've got a different audience then. And, they might be interested in where we are or pointing out, oh, we're just flying over Paris. And if you look, you might just see the Eiffel Tower, that sort of thing. So it really depends on the flights and what I'm seeing. Certainly for something like the Northern Lights, I definitely, because the cabin crew will be alert and I'd definitely ask if they want to come up to the flight deck and have a good look out the window because that would be quite, spectacular.
Emily Slade: Yeah. Oh, amazing. Out of curiosity, just before we wrap up, is there a notable disparity between the amount of women and men becoming not just pilots but captains, officers, that sort of thing, or is it fairly equal?
James Gosling: That's a fantastic question and I'm really glad you asked it. We want more women and we have more than when I started in aviation, but you know the airlines want to employ more as a sort of ratio. So if you're a woman thinking about this, then you know I'd encourage you to give it a go. And all of the airlines are really, equal opportunities and they want to employ more women, that's for sure.
Emily Slade: Yeah, fantastic. Amazing. Well, thank you so, much for your time today. This has been really interesting.
James Gosling: It's a pleasure, Emily. And for anyone who's thinking about a career in aviation, I can really recommend it, go for it.
Emily Slade: Thanks again to James for their time. For more information on becoming a pilot, you can head to prospects.ac.uk. If you enjoyed the episode, we'd love to hear from you. can contact us on podcast at prospects.ac.uk or leave us a review on Apple or Spotify. Thank you as always for listening and good luck on your journey to future you.
Notes on transcript
This transcript was produced using a combination of automated software and human transcribers and may contain errors. The audio version is definitive and should be checked before quoting.
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